


Sure.

by ozonecologne



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Friends to Lovers, M/M, in which there is a misunderstanding, not explicit but mentions of sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-16
Updated: 2015-06-16
Packaged: 2018-04-04 17:06:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4145775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ozonecologne/pseuds/ozonecologne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean starts his life with questions. It turns out he just hasn't been asking the right ones.<br/><i>Takes place in an alternate universe where your soul mate’s first words to you are tattooed on your skin.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Sure.

Let’s all pretend for a moment that this was a world where there was someone out there for you to find. Let’s imagine that you’d have known it was them the second they opened their mouth – you’d been spending years memorizing the way their words curled around your wrist, stretched down your thigh, wrapped around your ankle.

Some people had poems etched in their skin, tattoos of yearning that were truly testaments to love at first sight. Some had jokes that made them laugh well into middle age. Some had dirty pick-up lines they were embarrassed to be seen in, and some had a different language they'd spent years decoding. Some people would trace the strange markings with their fingertips under the shade of a tree, merely wondering what they could possibly mean when they hadn’t been taught to read. Those words were beautiful and mysterious and heart-wrenchingly painful to stare at, to not comprehend. They were bliss and prophecy and shame and hope, all profound things tangled together at once.

In this world, Dean Winchester's mark wasn’t like any one of those.

Dean's mark just said, "Sure."

He heard it for the first time – as far back as he could remember anyway – when he was just four years old, but he learned quickly that his soul mate could never be Mom or Dad or Sam because they were family, and that was a different kind of love. Dean didn't understand "kinds of love" or really what a soul mate even was, but he did understand that sometimes when people repeated that special word on his shoulder it didn’t mean they loved him the way he wanted to be loved. It kept him up for days.

He was fifteen when he got his heart broken for the first time. He started with a question. "Can you teach me?" and Robin – with sparkling eyes and a sweet smile – replied, "Sure," easy as could be. They spent long afternoons on the couch practicing guitar and kissing, and Dean thought that when the light hit her just right he wouldn’t have minded if it had been that face, this feeling, in his forever.

But it burned out pretty quickly, as all bright young things tend to do, and the hardest part to understand was that it wasn’t anybody’s fault.

He was seventeen, twenty-two, twenty-seven when it happened again. Amanda Heckerling, Cassie Robinson, Lisa Braeden, and some other ones in between: names he'd never say at the top of an altar, names he played over and over in his head at night. They weren't 'sure' about him, none of them were.

Nothing's sure in love, Dean discovered. It was a hard word to have because it could just as easily be a lie as it could become a promise. When the words on his skin were ordinary as they came, ordinary as he started to suspect he might be, he learned that the person who said them was just not always meant for him.

So Dean was pushing thirty, single, and just a little jaded. He had seen both poles of the spectrum: his father wasting away because of the loss of his soul mate, and his little brother planning his wedding to his. He just had to be the third category, the control group, the normal one of the family. And Dean was alright with being alone and plain. He’d made his peace with uncertain love.

It was in this frame of mind that he met Castiel Novak, Sales Associate.

Dean had volunteered to pick up some ingredients for dinner that Jess told him were only available at the organic market on the other side of town, but he had no idea where the fuck that actually was obviously and got lost a few times on the way.

(He also refused to use that fancy GPS Sam got him for Christmas the year before – it dirtied up his dashboard. It was stuck in the glove compartment under god knows what.)

In his disorientation he decided to stop for gas and collect his thoughts, muttering to himself the whole time as the tank filled.

The Gas-n-Sip was one of those antiquated establishments where you still had to pay inside the market after the fact – a cheap ploy to catch one’s attention with zebra cakes and neon slushies and get unsuspecting consumers to spend more money – so Dean trudged inside and sighed as he approached the counter.

"You got a pen?" he asked the guy, already rifling through his wallet.

"Sure," the cashier replied, and Dean almost snorted as he heard his reply.

Sometimes Dean asked a question on _purpose_ when he met someone he was interested in, because then he could trick himself into thinking this could be the one, and it would distract him from the inevitable lonely truth. But this guy was a nobody; he hadn’t meant to trick him into anything like that.

The cashier slid a chewed-up blue pen over the counter to Dean, who quickly signed his receipt and forked it over with his card. "Thanks. Hey, lemme get some beef jerky and a pack of menthols," Dean added. He knew Sam hated beef jerky and he was really craving a cigarette after the day he'd had.

"Sure," the cashier replied again, and Dean clenched his teeth. _No, absolutely not_ , he told his desperate hopes.

Two in a row meant nothing.

Still, Dean couldn’t help himself from looking him over quickly when he turned to grab the cigarettes. His nametag said _Castiel_ , which was real weird, but there was nothing especially remarkable about the guy except that he should probably have invested in a hairbrush.

"Here you are," Castiel said to him, sliding Dean's things over to him. He did have nice hands though, Dean noted distractedly. Long, gentle fingers.

Dean nodded and stuffed the things into his jacket. "Thanks."

And that was that. Dean paid, they parted ways, and Dean put the unremarkable cashier out of his mind as he tried to figure out what tapenade was actually made of.

 

He saw him again over the weekend. He was taking Sam to an early lunch, because Dean hardly ever saw him anymore and had heard some wonderful things about the new TDK Slammer.

Castiel was standing by the buffet, where Dean was headed himself, looking as unkempt as usual. "Hey," Dean said, pointing. "Castiel," he recalled.

Castiel inclined his head in recognition. "Jerky and menthols," he remembered. "Nice to see you again."

"Yeah, same." Dean cleared his throat and added, “I’m Dean, by the way.”

“Ah.”

Neither of them spoke much more beyond, "Enjoy your meal," and "See you around."

Dean slammed his plate down on the table and tried to fight off the mortification from such an awkward, stilted encounter. "Who was that?" Sam just had to ask. "Aw, did you make a new friend?"

Dean scoffed. "Shut up. He's just some weird guy from the gas station. Another 'sure,'" he felt compelled to add.

Sam perked up immediately. "Really?" He noticed Dean's sour look and winced. "No dice, huh?"

"Nah. You know how this goes, Sammy."

"One day, Dean," Sam threatened. "One day it's gonna be them."

Dean just snorted and stuffed his face.

 

Thing is, Dean kept running into this Castiel guy at the weirdest places. The Y when he went to work out, Goodwill when he was looking for steals (hey, the clothes were cheap, and Dean still lived in the 70's so everything there was still cool to him). Dude was everywhere. It was a little freaky. 

Even Sam came to him about it one night over the game. "So I saw your gas guy today -"

"Not my guy," Dean interrupted.

" – at the library, and he was literally asleep in the aisle." Sam hesitated like he wasn’t sure he should say what he was about to, and with concerned puppy eyes he blurted out those seven fateful words.

"Dean, I think he might be homeless."

Dean almost spat out his beer. "What? Come on, Sam, no way. It's a library! Nerds like you are there all hours of the day."

"I'm serious, Dean, hear me out," Sam continued, setting his beer bottle down. Dean didn’t want to think about the fact that Sam had been dwelling on this guy, thinking about him enough that he may have come to this conclusion. "Biggerson's, that Sunday? All you can eat buffet. Did you ever even see him leave?" Sam asked.

Dean made a face. "Maybe he just likes to eat!" _Like me_ , he thought victoriously.

Sam shot him a bitch face. "Dean, I'm pretty sure that guy doesn't even own a _comb_ ," he stressed.

Now that was definitely true, even Dean noticed. Castiel was always looking a little worn out: wrinkled clothes, bags under his eyes, messy hair. "Well, neither do I," was his best argument.

Sam rolled his eyes. "Yeah, but you use product. And shave regularly."

Now that he was mentioning it, Castiel did have some major 5 o'clock shadow going on... Could Sam be right? The Y, the library, Gas-n-Sip, Biggerson's – were those all just places Castiel went because he had nowhere else to go?

It was still not Dean's problem. "Well what do you want ME to do about it?" he asked grumpily. He really didn’t like the idea of that dorky guy brushing his teeth in that disgusting gas station bathroom, but what was he going to do? Confront him?

"Oh my god, Dean, this guy could be your _soul mate!_ Have a heart!"

"Christ, not this again." Dean dragged a hand over his face. They'd been over it a hundred times: Sam was not going to be satisfied until Dean was settled down and happy, and Dean had given up on the whole 'settling down' nonsense entirely. There was no reason to get all flustered over a gas station attendant.

Sam's pleading eyes humbled him a little. "Just be nice to him. Nobody deserves that, Dean, help him out. And DON'T spook him, all right? It's hard enough for people to ask for help. He doesn't want your pity."

Dean waved a hand dismissively in his direction. "I got it, I got it. Don't let him know I know. Can we just watch the game, now?"

 

Dean started buying gas exclusively from the Gas-n-Sip even though it was out of his way and he was pretty sure Baby hated him a little for it. He threw more money than he usually would into the tip jar on his way out, earning a squinty look on behalf of his favorite cashier. He was extra nice to Cas and asked him about his day, avoiding touchy topics like the weather and gas prices and most pop culture. Cas didn’t get any of his references. _Poor son of a bitch doesn't have a TV,_ Dean thought to himself mournfully one day.

It was getting out of hand. He didn’t even KNOW if Cas is homeless, and here he was treating the guy like a charity case.

His supervisor Nora, whom Dean had gotten to know a little better over the last few weeks, was stocking shelves one day while Cas was cleaning bathrooms. "Hey," he said secretively. "Do you know where Cas lives? Is there like a forwarding address you put on his paychecks?"

Nora smiled like she knew something Dean didn’t and shook her head. "No, it's direct deposit. I don't know where he goes."

And that wasn’t very encouraging, either.

He was still not really sure why he cared. Well, of course Dean _knew_ , but he didn’t want to admit it. Despite his best judgment, he was kind of fond of the guy, with his big eyes and his tiny smiles and his graveled "Hello, Dean." Maybe he was still a little excited. He couldn't stop pulling up his sleeve at night to look at the tiny red script across his shoulder in the mirror. He couldn’t stop looking at Cas and hearing his heart hammer out _What if? What if?_

After Nora's confession, he decided he should just casually check things out. He was doing this out of concern for a friend. He waited for Cas to leave Gas-n-Sip that night after a long shift (overtime), and rode a few blocks down in the Impala to keep an eye on him.

Cas turned into an alley a while after they left, and Dean stealthily parked and darted out, following on foot.

Apparently he wasn’t as stealthy as he thought, because as soon as he turned into the alley he was getting slammed against the brick wall behind him with a startled, "Oof!"

"Why are you following me?" Cas asked, too calmly but definitely less so than usual, and Dean shoved futilely against the arm currently crushing his windpipe.

"Dude! Take it easy! Ach!" _What, is this guy made of metal?_ He wasn’t budging.

Cas’s eyes were like blue fire, scorching when they met Dean’s. “You’ve been following me for _hours_ , Dean. I saw your car. Just what do you think you’re doing?”

“I just wanted to know where you were going!” Dean blurted, hands up and pressed against the wall so Cas wouldn't hurt him further. Although, as he said it out loud, it did sound a little creepy. He really wouldn’t blame the guy for decking him right here and now.

Cas narrowed his eyes, and then deadpan stated, “The dry cleaners.”

“And after that?”

Cas’s eyes sparked again. “None of your business.” He did let go of Dean though, and pinched the bridge of his nose with a little sigh. “I told Nora it was odd, but she _insisted_ that there was something…”

Dean reeled. “Wait, odd? What?” He couldn’t be talking about _him_ , could he?

Dean was like the opposite of odd. He was barely even noteworthy. He was Mr. Smooth, the absolute definition of cool and disinterested, Mayor Casual of Normal Town. He worked very hard to appear that way.

Cas sighed again and shrugged, looking defeated. “She told me you were asking about where I lived. At first I was just flattered you were interested but now…”

“No, no, you’ve got this mixed up, ok? I wasn’t – I’m not a stalker!” Dean said. Raising his voice was probably making him look even crazier, but hell, Castiel needed to get it through his thick skull that Dean was just _concerned_ , ok, he didn’t mean to cross any lines.

“That’s encouraging,” was Cas’s blunt response.

Dean dragged both his hands over his face. “Look. My little brother – at the library. He. And Biggerson’s. We thought you were _homeless_.”

Castiel blinked at him and frowned. “You thought I was –”

But Dean didn’t let him finish. Mayor Casual was officially handing in his resignation. “And I’m not even supposed to care, alright, but I do, because you said ‘Sure!’ And Sam’s all convinced you could be, you know, _it,_ so what was I gonna do? Let you live behind a dumpster somewhere? I don’t know,” Dean rambled, painfully aware that he was probably turning a hideous shade of red and running out of breath.

Wait, but Dean was pretty sure that was a _smile_ twitching at the corner of Castiel’s mouth. “Is ‘sure’ your word?” he asked, all traces of suspicion gone from his dumb, pretty face.

Dean sighed and gestured to his shoulder. “Yeah, ok, yes. Lame.”

Castiel shook his head. “No, not at all. I completely understand. Imagine having, ‘You got a pen.’ Anyone you run into on the street suddenly becomes your soul mate,” he said with a bashful flush of his own.

Dean froze. “Wait. But… _I_ said…”

Cas smiled at him. “You did,” he confirmed.

Dean thought about it for a moment, staring into Cas’s deep, deep blue eyes – how had he ever thought those were anything less than stunning? – and went, “Huh.”

They were still standing in the damp alley, just looking at each other like a couple of dumb asses, when Castiel shuffled his feet and said, “I do have a home, by the way. A bed.”

Dean’s throat clicked as he said, “Oh yeah? Good.”

Cas stared at him for a minute more before he cleared his throat. “Are you just going to take my word for it, or do you want to see for yourself?”

Oh my god. Oh my god, Dean _so_ wanted to see it. His brain was already short circuiting. All he could think about were Cas’s hands. “No, yeah, that sounds. Sure. Yep.”

The sex was explosive, it was electric, it was amazing – Cas fucked like a machine, like an angel, fit Dean like a glove (or, you know, the hand to Dean’s glove, whatever, he doesn’t have time for semantics) and left him wanting for nothing. He was attentive and confident in his movements, not particularly inventive but _thorough._ He kissed practically every inch of skin, licked up every letter printed on his body, worshipful, and Dean couldn’t get enough.

Once he was hoarse and sated and lying next to Cas in his very real bed in his very real apartment, he found himself turning his head and saying, “Hey, maybe we should… just give this a shot?”

So yes, Dean asked another question. He knew there were no guarantees, that he’d been let down before and that there was still the possibility Cas _wasn’t_ the one he’d been looking for. But it had been so long since he’d had someone to lie down with. Someone to lavish. Maybe Dean would end up with another broken heart (something told him this particular man had the power to crush it beyond repair), but maybe he’d end up staring into those blue eyes for the rest of his life.

That alone seemed worthy of taking a chance on.

It was Castiel who turned his head, smiled, and answered, “Sure.”

It was the first time Dean actually believed it.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm also on [tumblr!](http://ozonecologne.tumblr.com)


End file.
